This is a list of schools in Division I of the

National Collegiate Athletic Association The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges ...

(NCAA) that play football in the United States as a varsity sport and are members of the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), known as Division I-AA from 1978 through 2005. There are 130 FCS programs in the 2022 season. Conference affiliations are current for the 2022 season.The teams in this subdivision compete in a 24-team

playoff The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eithe ...

for the NCAA Division I Football Championship. All leagues allow scholarships with the exception of the Ivy League and Pioneer Football League.

FCS programs

Transitioning from Division II

The following programs are transitioning from

NCAA Division II NCAA Division II (D-II) is an intermediate-level division of competition in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). It offers an alternative to both the larger and better-funded Division I and to the scholarship-free environmen ...

to FCS, or have announced definitive plans to do so. Under current NCAA rules, they must have an invitation from a Division I conference to begin the transition. During the four-year transition period, they are ineligible for the FCS playoffs.

Transitioning from Division III

Normally, under current NCAA rules, teams are not allowed to reclassify directly from

NCAA Division III NCAA Division III (D-III) is a division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States. D-III consists of athletic programs at colleges and universities that choose not to offer athletic scholarships to their st ...

to Division I. However, after St. Thomas was involuntarily removed from the

Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference The Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) is a college athletic conference which competes in NCAA Division III. All 13 of the member schools are located in Minnesota and are private institutions, with only two being non-sectarian. ...

, they and their future primary conference home, the

Summit League The Summit League, or The Summit, is an NCAA Division I intercollegiate athletic conference with its membership mostly located in the Midwestern United States from Illinois on the East of the Mississippi River to the Dakotas and Nebraska on the W ...

, worked with the NCAA to move directly to Division I. On July 15, 2020, it was announced that the NCAA had approved this transition, and St. Thomas has played in Division I starting with the 2021 season.

Programs moving to FCS

Former Division I FCS football programs

References

External links

NCAA Football Championship Subdivision Sponsorship
{{College football FCS

NCAA Division I FCS The NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), formerly known as Division I-AA, is the second-highest level of college football in the United States, after the Football Bowl Subdivision. Sponsored by the National Collegiate Athletic ...